“This week, fans packed stadiums in London wearing their nation’s colors like rebels ready for battle in Mel Gibson’s army. They screamed with excitement and anguished in defeat. Many paid thousands of dollars to travel around the globe to be there.

What the hell is going on here? How do sports engage, delight, and motivate people to put their lives on hold and become totally engrossed in watching other people play games?”

I’m sure you can think of plenty of other examples of sports fandom producing highly unusual behaviour too. The one that leaps immediately to mind for me is the tens of thousands of Chelsea FC fans who descend on London’s Fulham Road for every home game, wearing team colours and singing songs that we wouldn’t dream of singing anywhere else (I have a Chelsea season ticket).

Why do people do this?

Nir says it’s because the combination of hope and variable rewards is a dizzyingly powerful cocktail for the brain. We all know that hope sells and is a powerful motivator, and as Nir has been saying for some years variable rewards are addictive because they kick the brain’s dopamine system into high gear. That’s why people play slot and fruit machines for so long.

Entrepreneurship is the same.

Except 10x.

The hope is much greater. The promise of changing the world and making millions of dollars is way more exciting than winning a football game. And the variation in rewards is much greater too. I’ve felt the highs and lows of football fandom, waking up the morning after a game instantly excited or groaning depending on what happened the day before, but that’s nothing compared to the euphoria that comes when a startup is doing well or the gut wrenching stress when it isn’t.

This psychology also explains why it’s so important for entrepreneurs to remain positive. If the hope goes, the motivation goes too, and then it’s a downward spiral. When things don’t go according to plan, balancing the need for positivity with the need for realism is one of the most difficult tasks founders face.